A companion to britain in the later middle ages

A Companion to Britain
in the Later Middle Ages

S. H. Rigby,
Editor

Blackwell Publishing


A Companion to Britain in the Later Middle Ages


This page intentionally left blank


A COMPANION TO
BRITAIN IN THE LATER
MIDDLE AGES
Edited by

S. H. Rigby


© 2003 by Blackwell Publishers Ltd
a Blackwell Publishing company
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The right of S. H. Rigby to be identified as the Author of the Editorial Material in this Work has been
asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs, and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
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permission of the publisher.
First published 2003 by Blackwell Publishers Ltd
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A companion to Britain in the later Middle Ages / edited by S. H. Rigby.
p. cm. – (Blackwell companions to British history)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-631-21785-1 (alk. paper)
1. Great Britain – History – Medieval period, 1066–1485 – Handbooks,
manuals, etc. 2. Great Britain – Civilization – 1066–1485 – Handbooks,
manuals, etc. I. Rigby, S. H. (Stephen Henry), 1955– II. Series.
DA175 .C598 2002
942.03–dc21
2002003368
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BLACKWELL COMPANIONS TO BRITISH HISTORY

Published in association with The Historical Association

This series provides sophisticated and authoritative overviews of the scholarship that has shaped our
current understanding of British history. Each volume comprises up to forty concise essays written by
individual scholars within their area of specialization. The aim of each contribution is to synthesize the
current state of scholarship from a variety of historical perspectives and to provide a statement on where
the field is heading. The essays are written in a clear, provocative, and lively manner, designed for an
international audience of scholars, students and general readers.
The Blackwell Companions to British History is a cornerstone of Blackwell’s overarching Companions to
History series, covering European, American and World history.
Published
A Companion to Britain in the Later Middle Ages
Edited by S. H. Rigby
A Companion to Stuart Britain
Edited by Barry Coward
A Companion to Eighteenth-Century Britain
Edited by H. T. Dickinson
A Companion to Early Twentieth-Century Britain
Edited by Chris Wrigley
In preparation
A Companion to Roman Britain
Edited by Malcolm Todd
A Companion to Britain in the Early Middle Ages
Edited by Pauline Stafford
A Companion to Tudor Britain
Edited by Robert Tittler and Norman Jones
A Companion to Nineteenth-Century Britain
Edited by Chris Williams
A Companion to Contemporary Britain
Edited by Paul Addison and Harriet Jones
The Historical Association is the voice for history. Since 1906 it has been bringing together people
who share an interest in, and love for, the past. It aims to further the study of teaching of history at

all levels. Membership is open to everyone: teacher and student, amateur and professional. Membership
offers a range of journals, activities and other benefits. Full details are available from The Historical
Association, 59a Kennington Park Road, London SE11 4JH, ,
www.history.org.uk.


Other Blackwell History Companions include:
BLACKWELL COMPANIONS TO HISTORY
Published
A Companion to Western Historical Thought
Edited by Lloyd Kramer and Sarah Maza
In preparation
A Companion to Gender History
Edited by Teresa Meade and Merry E. Weisner-Hanks
BLACKWELL COMPANIONS TO EUROPEAN HISTORY
Published
A Companion to the Worlds of the Renaissance
Edited by Guido Ruggiero
In preparation
A Companion to the Reformation World
Edited by R. Po-chia Hsia
A Companion to Europe Since 1945
Edited by Klaus Larres
A Companion to Europe 1900–1945
Edited by Gordon Martel
BLACKWELL COMPANIONS TO AMERICAN HISTORY
Published
A Companion to the American Revolution
Edited by Jack P. Greene and J. R. Pole
A Companion to 19th-Century America

Edited by William L. Barney
A Companion to the American South
Edited by John B. Boles
A Companion to American Indian History
Edited by Philip J. Deloria and Neal Salisbury
A Companion to American Women’s History
Edited by Nancy A. Hewitt
A Companion to Post-1945 America
Edited by Jean-Christophe Agnew and Roy Rosenzweig
A Companion to the Vietnam War
Edited by Marilyn B. Young and Robert Buzzanco
A Companion to Colonial America
Edited by Daniel Vickers
In preparation
A Companion to 20th-Century America
Edited by Stephen J. Whitfield
A Companion to the American West
Edited by William Deverell
A Companion to American Foreign Relations
Edited by Robert Schulzinger
BLACKWELL COMPANIONS TO WORLD HISTORY
In preparation
A Companion to the History of Africa
Edited by Joseph Miller
A Companion to the History of the Middle East
Edited by Youssef M. Choueiri


Contents

List of Figures

x

List of Plates

xi

List of Maps

xii

List of Contributors

xiii

Introduction

xvi

Part I Economy and Society in Town and Country
1 England: Land and People
Bruce M. S. Campbell

1
3

2 England: The Family and the Village Community
Phillipp R. Schofield

26

3 England: Towns, Trade and Industry
Richard H. Britnell

47

4 England: Popular Politics and Social Conflict
Jane Whittle and S. H. Rigby

65

5 England: Women and Gender
Judith M. Bennett

87

6 Scotland: Economy and Society
Nicholas J. Mayhew

107

7 Wales: Economy and Society
A. D. Carr

125

8 Ireland: Economy and Society
Brian Graham

142


viii

contents

Part II Politics, Government and Law
9 The British Perspective
Seán Duffy

163
165

10 England: Kingship and the Political Community, c.1100–1272
Ralph V. Turner

183

11 England: Kingship and the Political Community, 1272–1377
Scott L. Waugh

208

12 England: Kingship and the Political Community, 1377–c.1500
Rosemary Horrox

224

13 England: Law, Society and the State

Robert C. Palmer

242

14 England: The Nobility and the Gentry
Christine Carpenter

261

15 Scotland: Politics, Government and Law
Hector L. MacQueen

283

16 Wales: Politics, Government and Law
J. Beverley Smith and Llinos Beverley Smith

309

17 Ireland: Politics, Government and Law
James Lydon

335

Part III The Church and Piety

357

18 England: Church and Clergy
David Lepine

359

19 England: Piety, Heresy and Anti-clericalism
Matthew Groom

381

20 Scotland: Religion and Piety
D. E. R. Watt

396

21 Wales: Religion and Piety
Huw Pryce

411

22 Ireland: Religion and Piety
Henry A. Jefferies

430

Part IV Education and Culture

449

23 England: Education and Society
Jo Ann H. Moran Cruz

451

24 England: Art and Society
Veronica Sekules

472


contents

ix

25 England: Literature and Society
S. H. Rigby

497

26 Scotland: Culture and Society
Louise O. Fradenburg

521

27 Wales: Culture and Society
Susan L. Aronstein

541

28 Ireland: Culture and Society
Edel Bhreathnach and Raghnall Ó Floinn

558

Bibliography of Secondary Sources

596

Index

649


Figures

12.1
12.2
12.3
13.1
15.1

The descendants of Henry III – simplified
The descendants of Edward III – simplified
The Beauforts: illegitimate descendants of John of Gaunt
Distribution of litigation: court of common pleas
Genealogical table: Malcolm III to James IV

227
228
229
250
297

Plates

24.1 Nave of Norwich cathedral looking east, showing decorated piers at
the crossing, c.1100
24.2 Christ in majesty, tympanum over the south porch entrance,
Malmesbury abbey, Wilts., c.1120
24.3 Matthew Paris, Map of Britain, c.1255
24.4 Crucifixion, Lambeth Apocalypse, c.1260–7
24.5 Exterior elevation of Beauchamp chapel, St Mary’s, Warwick,
1441–52
24.6 Donor image, stained glass, Holy Trinity parish church, Long
Melford, Suffolk, 1480s
28.1 The Cross of Cong
28.2 Cormac’s Chapel, Cashel, Co. Tipperary
28.3 West doorway, St Canice’s cathedral, Kilkenny, c.1260
28.4 Trim castle, Co. Meath
28.5 The Shrine of the Stowe Missal
28.6 Tomb of an Irish king or nobleman, Corcomroe, Co. Clare
28.7 The Dunvegan Cup

475
479
481
484
488
490
563
565

566
567
570
572
574


Maps

6.1
6.2
8.1
8.2
10.1
15.1
15.2
16.1
17.1
20.1
21.1
22.1

Scotland: land quality
Scotland: burghs in existence by 1300
The Anglo-Norman colonization of Ireland
Towns and boroughs in late medieval Ireland, c.1300
Counties of England
Scotland: earldoms and ‘provincial lordships’, 1124 to 1286
Scotland: earldoms and lordships about 1405
The major administrative and lordship divisions of Wales in the

fourteenth century
Ireland: politics and government
The Scottish church c.1300
Dioceses, religious houses and other churches in Wales, c.1300
The dioceses of Ireland, c.1300

108
110
150
155
193
291
304
324
337
399
418
434


Contributors

Susan L. Aronstein, Associate Professor of
English, University of Wyoming. Her
publications include articles on medieval
Welsh and French Arthurian romance and
on medievalism and popular culture, including a forthcoming volume, Arthurian
Film: Hollywood Knights: Arthurian
Cinema and the Politics of Nostalgia.
Judith M. Bennett, Martha Nell Hardy Distinguished Professor of History, University

of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her
publications include Ale, Beer and Brewsters
in Medieval England: Women’s Work in a
Changing World (1996) and A Medieval
Life: Cecilia Penifader of Brigstock,
c.1297–1344 (1998).
Edel Bhreathnach is Post-doctoral Fellow
at the Centre for the Study of Human
Settlement and Historical Change at the
National University of Ireland. She specializes in early medieval Irish history and is
author of Tara: A Select Bibliography
(1995).
Richard H. Britnell, Professor of History,
University of Durham. His publications
include Growth and Decline in Colchester,
1300–1525 (1986) and The Commercialisation of English Society, 1000–1500 (1993,
1995).
Bruce M. S. Campbell, Professor of
Medieval Economic History at The
Queen’s University of Belfast. His publications include Land, Labour and Livestock:

Historical Studies in European Agricultural Productivity (edited with M.
Overton; 1991), A Medieval Capital and
its Grain Supply: Agrarian Production and
its Distribution in the London Region,
c.1300 (with J. A. Galloway, D. J. Keene
and M. Murphy; 1993) and English
Seigniorial Agriculture, 1250–1450 (2000).
Christine Carpenter, Reader in History in
the University of Cambridge and Fellow of

New Hall. Her publications include Locality and Polity: A Study of Warwickshire
Landed Society, 1401–1499 (1992), The
Wars of the Roses: Politics and the Constitution of England, c.1437–1509 (1997) and
The Armburgh Papers (1998).
A. D. Carr, Professor of Medieval Welsh
History, University of Wales, Bangor. His
publications include Medieval Anglesey
(1982), Owen of Wales: The End of the
House of Gwynedd (1991) and Medieval
Wales (1995).
Seán Duffy is a Fellow of Trinity College,
Dublin, where he is head of the Department of Medieval History. His publications
include Ireland in the Middle Ages (1997)
and The Atlas of Irish History (1997, 2001).
Louise O. Aranye Fradenburg is Professor
of English and Comparative Literature at
the University of California, Santa Barbara.
Her publications include City, Marriage,
Tournament: Arts of Rule in Late Medieval
Scotland (1991), Premodern Sexualities


xiv

contributors

(1996) and Sacrifice Your Love: Psychoanalysis, Historicism, Chaucer (2002).
Brian Graham, Director, Academy for Irish
Cultural Heritages, University of Ulster.
His publications include An Historical

Geography of Ireland (with L. J. Proudfoot,
1993) and In Search of Ireland: A Cultural
Geography (1997), in addition to numerous articles discussing the historical and
cultural geography of Ireland from the
medieval period to the present day.
Matthew Groom has recently been awarded
a University of London Ph.D. for his thesis
on lay piety in late medieval Surrey.
Rosemary Horrox, Fellow and Director of
Studies in History at Fitzwilliam College,
Cambridge. Her books include Richard
III: A Study in Service (1989) and she is the
editor of Fifteenth-Century Attitudes: Perceptions of Society in Late Medieval England
(1994).
Henry A. Jefferies teaches at Thornhill
College, Derry. He is the author of Priests
and Prelates in the Age of Reformations
(1997), and senior editor of History of the
Diocese of Derry (with C. Devlin; 2000) and
of Tyrone: History and Society (with C.
Dillon; 2000).
David Lepine teaches history at Dartford
Grammar School and is an Honorary
Research Fellow at the University of Exeter.
His publications include A Brotherhood
of Canons Serving God: English Secular
Cathedrals in the Later Middle Ages (1995)
and a contribution to G. Aylmer and
J. Tiller, Hereford Cathedral, a History
(2000).

James Lydon, Emeritus Fellow and formerly
Lecky Professor of Modern History, Trinity
College, Dublin. His publications include
The Lordship of Ireland in the Middle Ages
(1972) and Ireland in the Later Middle
Ages (1973).
Hector L. MacQueen, Professor of Private
Law in the University of Edinburgh. He
is the author of Common Law and
Feudal Society in Medieval Scotland (1993)
and of numerous articles on the history of
law, and was co-editor, with P. G. B.
McNeill, of the Atlas of Scottish History to
1707 (1996).

Nicholas J. Mayhew, Fellow of St Cross
College, Oxford, and Reader in Medieval
Numismatics, Keeper of the Heberden
Coin Room, Ashmolean Museum. His
publications include Changing Values in
Medieval Scotland (with E. Gemmill; 1995)
and Sterling: The History of a Currency
(2000).
Jo Ann Hoeppner Moran Cruz, Associate
Professor and past Chair, Department of
History, Georgetown University. Her publications include Education and Learning
in the City of York, 1300–1560 (1979), The
Growth of English Schooling, 1340–1548:
Learning, Literacy and Laicization in the
Pre-Reformation York Diocese (1985) and

a number of articles on education in
medieval England.
Raghnall Ó Floinn is Assistant Keeper of
Irish Antiquities at the National Museum
of Ireland, specializing in the archaeology
of medieval Ireland. He has published
widely on medieval Irish art and archaeology and his publications include Irish
Shrines and Reliquaries of the Middle Ages
(1994) and Ireland and Scandinavia in the
Early Viking Age (1998).
Robert C. Palmer, Cullen Professor of
History and Law, University of Houston.
His publications include County Courts of
Medieval England (1982), The Whilton
Dispute (1984) and English Law in the Age
of the Black Death (1993).
Huw Pryce, Senior Lecturer in History, University of Wales, Bangor. His publications
include Native Law and the Church in
Medieval Wales (1993) and the edited
volume Literacy in Medieval Celtic Societies
(1998).
S. H. Rigby, Reader in History, University
of Manchester. His publications include
Marxism and History: A Critical Introduction (1987, 1998), Engels and the Formation of Marxism: History, Dialectics and
Revolution (1992), Medieval Grimsby:
Growth and Decline (1993), English Society
in the Later Middle Ages: Class, Status and
Gender (1995) and Chaucer in Context:
Society, Allegory and Gender (1996).
Phillipp R. Schofield, Lecturer in Medieval

History, University of Wales, Aberystwyth.


contributors
His publications include Peasant and Community in Medieval England, 1200–1500
(2002) and a number of articles on rural
society in medieval England.
Veronica Sekules, F.S.A., F.R.S.A., Head of
Education, Sainsbury Centre for Visual
Arts, University of East Anglia. Her publications include Medieval Art (2001) and a
number of articles on medieval English art
history.
J. Beverley Smith, Emeritus Professor, University of Wales, Aberystwyth. His publications include Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, Prince
of Wales (1988) and a number of articles on
medieval Welsh history.
Llinos Beverley Smith, Senior Lecturer,
Department of History and Welsh History,
University of Wales, Aberystwyth. Her
publications include a number of articles on
medieval Welsh history and chapters in
H. Pryce, Literacy in Medieval Celtic
Studies (1998) and M. Roberts and
S. Clarke, Women and Gender in Early
Modern Wales (2000).
Ralph V. Turner, Distinguished Professor of
History, Emeritus, Florida State University,

xv

Tallahasee, Florida, USA. His publications

include The English Judiciary in the Age of
Glanvill and Bracton (1985), Men Raised
from the Dust (1988) and King John
(1994).
D. E. R. Watt, Emeritus Professor of
Scottish Church History, Department
of Medieval History, University of St
Andrews. His publications include A Biographical Dictionary of Scottish Graduates
to A.D. 1410 (1977), Scotichronicon (9 vols;
1987–98) and Medieval Church Councils in
Scotland (2000).
Scott L. Waugh, Professor of History, University of California, Los Angeles. His publications include The Lordship of England:
Royal Wardships and Marriages in English
Society and Politics, 1217–1327 (1988)
and England in the Reign of Edward III
(1991).
Jane Whittle is Senior Lecturer in History at
Exeter University. Her publications include
The Development of Agrarian Capitalism in
Norfolk, 1440–1580 (2000), along with a
number of articles on late medieval English
rural history.


Introduction
S. H. Rigby

The number of scholars currently studying Britain in the later middle ages is relatively small when compared with that for more recent historical periods. Even so, as
a glance at the books and articles listed in bibliographical guides such as the Historical Association’s Annual Bulletin of Historical Literature will reveal, it is now virtually impossible for any one individual to keep up with the flood of work that is
currently being published on the economic, social, political, religious and cultural

history of Britain in the later middle ages. The aim of this Companion is to help the
general and student reader to begin making sense of this mass of literature, to introduce them to the major themes and developments in British history in the period
from c.1100 to c.1500, and to familiarize them with some of the most influential
approaches and perspectives with which historians have attempted to make sense of
this period. The ‘later middle ages’ is defined here as the period from c.1100 to
c.1500, in distinction to the ‘early’ medieval period covered by the previous volume
in this series, rather than in terms of the more familiar distinctions between the early
(c.400–1000), high (c.1000–1300) and late (c.1300–1500) medieval periods. Whilst
the division of history into separate periods is inevitable, it is also artificial and
misleading. There is, after all, no reason why the history of, say, population or the
economy should have the same rhythm of development as that of religion or of the
visual arts. Nevertheless, the period covered in this volume can be seen as a relatively
coherent one, being given a unity by the arrival of an aggressively expansionist
Norman-French political culture at its beginning and marked at its terminus by the
Reformation and by a renewed growth of population after the century and a half’s
downturn which followed the arrival of plague in Britain in 1348.
Perhaps the biggest single decision which had to be taken in choosing the chapters and contributors for this volume was whether its themes should be discussed in
relation to the British Isles as a whole or whether England, Ireland, Scotland and
Wales should be treated in separate chapters. Certainly, one of the main changes in
the historiography of the last generation has been the rise of a ‘British history’ perspective emphasizing the interaction of all four countries and the need for historians
to adopt a comparative approach to their development. The benefits of this per-


introduction

xvii

spective are outlined below by Seán Duffy. Nevertheless, as Seán himself emphasizes,
in the period covered by this volume Scotland was a separate nation whilst much of
Ireland and (at least in the period before Edward I) of Wales were not under English

control. There is arguably no more reason why these countries should be regarded
as sharing a single history than should, say, England and France, important though
the interactions of the two were and instructive though comparisons and contrasts
between them might be. Thus, the decision to devote separate chapters to England,
Ireland, Wales and Scotland in this volume certainly did not result from any anglocentric viewpoint as opposed to a more inclusive ‘British’ perspective. On the contrary, it arose from a desire to do justice to the history of each of Britain’s component
parts. Indeed, in relation to their populations, the sources available and the numbers
of scholars and students studying them, one could contend that Ireland, Scotland
and Wales are over-represented in terms of the space devoted to them in this volume.
However, I make no apology for this given the renewed attention which the histories of Ireland, Scotland and Wales have received in recent years.
All of the contributors to this Companion have had a free hand in writing their
own chapters. As editor, I have asked only that they provide their readers with some
guidance about earlier work on their subject so as to locate current concerns and
debates within a broader historiographical context. History is, of course, a mansion
with many rooms and so, inevitably, individual contributors have adopted very different approaches to their subject matter. Some have provided overviews of their field
whilst others have supplied us with the results of their own original archival research.
Some have opted for chronological narratives whilst others have adopted a more
thematic approach. Together, their work reveals the rich diversity of ways in which
historians from what are, in intellectual terms, a wide range of different ‘generations’
have made sense of Britain in the later middle ages and looks forward to new questions and research in the field. A unified bibliography incorporating secondary sources
mentioned in the text is provided at the end of this volume. Within each chapter,
references in notes are given in full unless they appear in the bibliography or further
reading list at the end of the chapter, in which case they are given in shortened form.
In editing this volume, I have benefited from the assistance and advice of many
friends and colleagues. The editorial staff at Blackwell, including Brigitte Lee, the copy
editor, have been particularly helpful and encouraging, whilst the comments of the
anonymous readers on the original proposal for this volume helped to clarify its themes
and structure. I would like to thank all of the contributors for their patience in dealing
with my comments and queries and, in particular, Donald Watt, who for some reason
always seemed to end up as the chief victim of my editorial incompetence. The publisher is extremely grateful to the Atlas Trustees of the Scottish Medievalists Conference for permission to use maps composed by A. A. M. Duncan, A. Grant, I. A.
Morrison, K. J. Stringer and D. E. R. Watt that were originally published in the indispensable Atlas of Scottish History to 1707 (Scottish Medievalists Conference, 1996),

edited by H. L. MacQueen and P. G. B. McNeill. Particular thanks are due to Jane
Whittle, who stepped in to provide most of chapter 4 (on rural social conflict) when,
rather late in the day, another contributor had to drop out. Apologies are owed to
readers for inflicting them with my own views on urban social conflict in this chapter.
Their inclusion was the result of the same emergency rather than of any desire on my
part to appear in two chapters of this volume. Matthew Groom is also deserving of


xviii

s. h. rigby

special thanks for stepping in to provide chapter 19 when, at the very last moment,
the original contributor had to withdraw from the volume. In writing my own chapter
on literature and society I benefited immensely from the expert advice of Gail Ashton,
Alcuin Blamires, Bruce Campbell, Richard Davies and Carole Weinberg. Above all,
I would like to thank Rosalind Brown-Grant not only for her comments on that
chapter but for her continuing support throughout this project.


Part I

Economy and Society in Town
and Country


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Chapter One

England: Land and People
Bruce M. S. Campbell

Culturally, socially, politically and, above all, economically, medieval England was
rooted in the land. In 1086 probably three-quarters or more of all income came
directly from the land and four centuries later, at the close of the middle ages, the
equivalent proportion undoubtedly remained well over 60 per cent. Nevertheless,
land was more than a simple factor of production; title to land conferred status,
power, wealth and obligations. Feudal lords, whether lay or ecclesiastical, were land
lords in a very real sense and they valued their estates for the standing and influence
these bestowed and for the recreational amenity they provided as well as for the
incomes that they generated. Yet for no one, bar the monarch, was proprietorship
absolute. Under the system of land tenure introduced by William the Conqueror, all
land was ultimately held from the king in return for homage, service and payment.
Tenants who held in chief from the crown in turn subinfeudated land on similar terms
to lesser lords, who might further subinfeudate their estates to others. The complex
hierarchy of proprietorship thereby created was mapped onto the land via the manorial system. Manors comprised land, tenants and jurisdictional rights in an almost infinite variety of forms and combinations. Many of the tenantry, who actually occupied
and worked the land and paid rent to do so, were servile as well as subordinate. Status
and tenure were inextricably interlinked. Labour, like land, therefore, was not yet
freely owned as a factor of production. For the medieval peasantry, whether free or
unfree, the significance of land lay primarily in the livelihood to be derived from it
and the security against want that it provided in an age without institutionalized
welfare. Relatively few were wholly landless and within the countryside those who
were generally ranked amongst the most vulnerable in society.
Agriculture was the very foundation of the national economy and throughout the
medieval centuries, and long after, performed a trilogy of key functions. First, and
most obviously, agriculture fed the population, both urban and rural, non-agricultural and agricultural. Second, it reproduced and sustained the animate sources of
draught power – the horses and oxen – employed throughout the economy. Third,
it supplied the manufacturing sector with organic raw materials: timber, wood and

charcoal; textile fibres from both plants and animals; dye plants and other industrial


4

bruce m. s. campbell

crops; furs, pelts, skins and hides; fat and tallow; wax; grain (for brewing) and straw
for thatching and a host of other humble purposes. For agriculture to fulfil this trilogy
of functions required most of the land, the bulk of the labour force, much of the
capital and a great deal of the management talent available within the national
economy. How efficiently these were exploited depended upon many factors, institutional as well as environmental, cultural as well as economic, and exogenous as well
as endogenous.
No closed economy could develop beyond the limits imposed by the output and
productivity of its agricultural sector. Yet for small countries like England agricultural
development was itself contingent upon the wider market opportunities bestowed by
the economy becoming more open. Of course, England had never been a completely
closed economy and it became less so as the middle ages advanced and a greater
international division of labour became established through the growth of trade and
commerce. Until late in the fourteenth century England’s principal comparative
advantage lay in the export of unprocessed primary products – wool above all, plus
hides, grain, firewood, tin, lead and coal. These were exchanged for other primary
products (timber, wax, hides and fish), certain industrial raw materials, such luxuries
as wine and furs, and manufactured goods. This pattern of trade, with its pronounced
agricultural bias, reflects the relatively undeveloped state of the European economy
at that time. The core of that economy remained located in the Mediterranean
whence it was linked by overland trade routes east to Asia and north to Flanders and
thence England. England, especially outside of the extreme south-east, thus occupied a relatively peripheral location within the wider European economy and consequently was less urbanized and supported a smaller manufacturing sector than more
advantageously located economies such as Flanders and Italy.
By the close of the middle ages, in contrast, England was adding value to its agricultural exports by processing much of its wool into cloth, inanimate power was being

harnessed more fully to industrial processes, and a growing share of the profits of
trade were accruing to denizen merchants. Advances in geographical and scientific
knowledge were also transforming the country’s location, as the Atlantic was opened
up as a commercial alternative to the Mediterranean and a direct maritime link was
at last established with the East. From these developments much would subsequently
stem. Expanding international trade and commerce coupled with fuller utilization of
inanimate power sources and greater usage of imported and inorganic raw materials
would release England from too exclusive and narrow a self-sufficiency. Ultimately
this would lead to industrial revolution. Nevertheless, in the more geographically
circumscribed and economically and technologically less sophisticated world of the
middle ages, the growth of non-agricultural populations and activities remained contingent upon the sustained expansion and diversification of national agricultural
output. Never again would the country be so wholly dependent for food, raw materials, fuel, draught power and exports upon its own agricultural sector. Verdicts
upon the overall performance of the medieval economy therefore tend to hinge upon
how adequately that sector stood up to the considerable demands placed upon it.
Hitherto, those verdicts have been predominantly negative.
For M. M. Postan, and those who have subscribed to his ‘population-resources’
account of economic developments, long-term demographic and economic expansion were not indefinitely sustainable on an agrarian base without higher rates of


england: land and people

5

investment and more developed forms of technology than those attainable under
feudal socio-property relations. According to this view the acute land-hunger,
depressed living standards and heavy famine mortality of the early fourteenth century
were the price paid for a century or more of headlong population growth. Moreover,
the crisis was rendered all the more profound by a failure of agricultural productivity, both of land and labour. For the alternative Marxist school of thought, articulated most forcibly by Robert Brenner, the failure of agricultural productivity was
more fundamental than the growth of population and was an inevitable consequence
of the exploitative nature of feudal socio-property relations, which deterred both

investment and innovation. For both Postan and Brenner nemesis was the price paid
for expansion; they differ primarily in their diagnoses of the root cause.
More recently, however, there has been a fuller appreciation of the international
dimensions of the early fourteenth-century crisis and with it a shift towards explanations that are less narrowly agrarian. Nor were feudal socio-property relations exclusively malign. Lords were rarely as rapacious and serfs as oppressed and exploited as
has often been represented. Rather, it was the territorial and dynastic ambitions of
militaristic kings and nobles that proved most damaging by fuelling the explosion of
warfare that characterized the fourteenth century. War, by increasing risks and driving
up costs, helped induce the trade-based economic recession that is now recognized
as an important component of the period. Taxation and purveyance depleted capital
resources and siphoned off potential investment capital. Commodity markets and
capital markets were both disrupted. As market demand contracted so employment
opportunities withered and population was forced back upon the land. Given this
deteriorating economic situation it is easy to see why historians have relegated the
climatic and biological catastrophes of famine, murrain and plague to essentially secondary roles. Yet this fails to do justice to the magnitude and uniqueness of this
sequence of environmental events. By any standard these were major exogenous
shocks which through their impact transformed the status quo and thereby altered
the course of development. Indeed, a mounting body of archaeological evidence suggests that the climatic and biological disasters of the period were themselves interconnected in ways that have yet to be unravelled. The exogenous dimensions of the
crisis are thus ripe for reassessment. This rethinking of the period is likely to continue as more evidence is assembled and developments in England are interpreted
within a broader geographical framework and wider historical context.

Challenges and Dilemmas
All agrarian-based economies, such as that of pre-industrial England, had to contend
with five long-enduring dilemmas, each of which was capable of thwarting progress
and precipitating crisis. The first of these dilemmas was a ‘tenurial dilemma’ of how
most effectively to occupy the land and on what terms. It was landlords who by controlling tenure regulated access to land. The terms upon which land was granted to
those who worked it determined the number, size and layout of the units of production and, accordingly, the nature of the labour process (servile, hired, familial).
Tenure likewise determined the ‘rent’ paid for the land and the form that this took,
typically labour, kind or cash. Efficient forms of tenure were those which delivered
the best returns to land and the labour and capital invested in it. Tenure, however,

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bruce m. s. campbell

was institutionally determined and characteristically slower to reform than economic
circumstances were to change. Not unusually, it was tenurial inertia that frustrated
fuller and more efficient use of the land.
Medieval tenures were rooted in local custom and manorial jurisdictions and could
vary with dramatic effect from manor to manor, with far-reaching demographic and
economic consequences. Some manors boasted substantial demesnes which might be
managed on behalf of the lord or leased to tenants, others lacked them; on some
manors the bulk of tenants held by customary tenures of one sort or another, on
others free tenure prevailed; some tenants were burdened with rent and owed heavy
labour services to their lords, many others owed fixed money rents that no longer
reflected the full economic value of the land; on some manors lords insisted on the
immutability of holdings and opposed any attempts to subdivide or engross, on others
a lively peasant land market prevailed and holdings were constantly changing in
number, size and composition. By 1300, on the evidence of the inquisitiones post
mortem, more tenants held by free than by unfree tenure, more paid a sub-economic
than a full rack rent, and there were many more small holdings than large. These
traits were more pronounced on small manors than large, on lesser estates rather than
greater, and on estates in lay hands rather than those in episcopal and Benedictine
ownership. Such diverse tenurial arrangements were the source of much economic
inefficiency but were neither quick nor easy to change. They were also the stuff of
much agrarian discontent, which occasionally flared up in direct conflict between
tenants and landlords. Tenurial reform was a major challenge, especially at times of
acute population pressure. Legal impediments could retard progress and there were
often political and humanitarian obstacles to be overcome. Change was generally
most easily implemented when land was in relative abundance, as was the case

throughout the fifteenth century.
Second, there was an ‘ecological dilemma’ of how to maintain and raise output
without jeopardizing the productivity of the soil by overcropping and overgrazing.
Medieval agriculture was organic and although there was much sound experience and
lore on how best to work the land there was no scientific knowledge per se. Medieval
agricultural treatises stressed best-practice financial and management arrangements
and only at the very close of the middle ages was there a renewal of scientific interest in plants and animals, stimulated by the writings of Columella, Pier de’ Crescenzi
and Palladius. Then, as now, the key to sustaining output lay in maintaining the nutrient balance within the soil, especially the three essential nutrients of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. Scarcity in any one of these would inhibit plant growth. The
nutrients removed in harvested crops consequently needed constant replenishment.
The techniques available to medieval husbandmen in order to achieve this included
crop rotation, sowing nitrifying courses of legumes (peas, beans and vetches), fallowing, alternating land between arable and grass (ley husbandry), dunging, manuring and marling. All required effort and organization, which were most likely to be
applied wherever land was scarce and labour abundant.
Paradoxically, it was cheap land and dear labour that were most likely to lead to
a ‘slash and burn’ approach to the soil. The same circumstances could also result in
the kind of ‘tragedy of the commons’ that arose from poorly policed common property rights, whereby individuals pursued self-interest to the detriment of the common
good. The hypothesis that arable soils tended to become exhausted has appealed to